Not every Baskin-Robbins Japan branch has it, but it’s very much worth tracking down.

Among the frozen treat faithful Baskin-Robbins, or “Thirty-one” as fans in Japan call it, is known for being a quick, casual, and youthful place to get your ice cream fix. So imagine our surprise when we found out that the chain also serves up desserts that are elegant, sophisticated, and worthy of being enjoying at a leisurely pace.

We made this discovery while shopping at the Baskin-Robbins branch at the Bay Quarter shopping center in the city of Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture. The Bay Quarter Baskin-Robbins has an eat-in area, which is important, but more important is that it also serves the chain’s 31 Cafe items.

This supplementary menu includes caffe lates and fruit sodas, the sort of thing you might linger over while lounging about in a cafe. And while those beverages were tempting, the big star here is the 31 Cafe affogato.

Yes, Baskin-Robbins offers the fancy Italian indulgence of ice cream and espresso, but with a few important twists. First, while orthodox affogato uses only vanilla ice cream, Baskin-Robbins is all about letting you choose from a wide variety of flavors, so you can pick from any ice cream varieties they have on the menu. Wisely, they realize that it can be insurmountably difficult to pick just one, so Baskin-Robbins’ affogato lets you select two scoops (though, if your cravings are laser-focuses, ostensibly you could get two scoops of the same flavor).

Also, instead of the typical decision between cup or cone, the Baskin-Robbins affogato gives you both, as the ice cream (and later espresso) goes in a coffee cup, but you still get a cone, and some whipped cream too, as toppings.

For our taste test, we opted for one scoop of Caramel Ribbon and one of Nuts to You, figuring they’d pair better with the incoming coffee notes than, say, Dragon Quest fizzy pineapple or Animal Crossing apple/pear. Since the espresso comes in its own little pitcher on the side, we started by taking little reminder nibbles of the ice cream, and both flavors were as delicious as we’d remembered, so much so that it took a lot of willpower to keep from eating them up just as they came.

But we remembered why we were here, and so we poured the espresso into the cup, making sure to thoroughly cover both scoops, and were rewarded for our show of willpower when we tasted the resulting combination, which was fantastic.

Both of the ice cream flavors we’d chosen have very rich flavors, and that still shined through after the addition of the espresso, but now with an added mature elegance to it. Halfway through, we used our spoon to crush the cone and mix in its pieces, adding an invigorating crunch to every bite that came after.

Given Baskin-Robbins’ image as a quick and casual place, it wouldn’t have been a shock had their affogato had merely a quirky novelty-level of quality. We’re very happy to report, though, that this is a legitimately classy and delicious dessert, and at 680 yen (US$4.20), not a bad deal at all in terms of price. The only downside we can find is that it’ll probably take some searching to find Baskin-Robbin’s Japan’s affogato, since while it’s not exclusive to the Bay Quarter branch, it is exclusive to branches that serve the 31 Cafe menu, and the chain’s official website doesn’t have any searchable list of such locations (though if the branch we visited is any indication, locations that do serve the 31 Cafe Menu will have signage indicating so).

On the plus side, though, even if it takes some legwork to track this dessert down, it’s definitely worth trying, and you’ll have plenty of time to rest your feet as you sit and enjoy it.

Location information
Thirty-one Ice Cream (Yokohama Bay Quarter branch) / サーティワンアイスクリーム（横浜ベイクォーター店）
Address: Kanagawa-ken, Yokohama-shi, Kanagawa-ku, Kinkocho 1-10
神奈川県横浜市神奈川区金港町1-10
Open 9 a.m.-9 p.m.
Website

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